Tag Archives: afternoon

Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Lakes Below Duck Pass, Afternoon Showers

Leave a comment
Lakes Below Duck Pass, Afternoon Showers
Lakes Below Duck Pass, Afternoon Showers

Lakes Below Duck Pass, Afternoon Showers. Sierra Nevada, California. August 5, 2005. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sun breaks through the clouds to illuminate lakes and surrounding meadows in the valley below Duck Pass near Mammoth Lakes, California.

This is an older shot that I recently realized has not yet been posted here. There is a bit of an ironic story behind getting this shot. A few days earlier some friends and I had started on a 14-day backpacking along a good size chunk of the John Muir Trail. (Including one short section that I have yet to hike!) After about four days on the trail we arrived an Purple Lake, a bit south of Mammoth, where I began to feel a bit “under the weather.” Because the next portion of the hike would travel across a section of the JMT that doesn’t provide many quick exits in case of emergency, I decided that I would evaluate my condition the next morning before heading on.

I still didn’t feel great when I awoke so, being cautious, I regretfully left the rest of my group and backtracked towards Duck Pass with a plan to exit to Mammoth Lakes and head home. So, it was an accident that found me descending this section below Duck Pass in this wonderful weather of mixed thundershowers alternating with bursts of sunlight – and which put me in the right place at the right time to see this beautiful scene as sunlight passed across this set of lakes.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | Facebook | Email

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Hitchcock Lakes

Leave a comment

High Lakes, Trail Crest
Terrain to the west of Whitney Trail Crest

Hitchcock Lakes from the Mt. Whitney Trail. Sequoia National Park, California. August 11, 2008. © Copyright 2008 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Hitchcock Lakes seen from the Mt. Whitney Trail.

I climbed Mount Whitney – again – on August 11, 2008 after crossing the Sierra Nevada from west to east on Sequoia National Park’s High Sierra Trail. I’ve been to the summit a couple times in the past. Last year I swore I would not climb this peak again, mainly because there are so many other beautiful things to see in the Sierra and I didn’t feel a strong need to do this again. But my friends proposed a trip that concluded with the Whitney ascent, and I couldn’t say no.

A traditional starting point for ascents from the west is Guitar Lake, a small – and often somewhat crowded – little lake in a truly alpine setting just above timberline. From here the trail ascends the valley containing these lakes, leading to the junction with the trail from the east side just before reaching the ridge, and then a lateral trail traverses out to the summit of Whitney.

It won’t surprise anyone if I say that there are some wonderful panoramas to be seen from almost any point on this climb. One of my favorite is this view back across the valley from which the trail ascended and towards high elevation Hitchcock Lakes and the ridge between them and the Crabtree Basin beyond.

(Oddly, I often find the summit view to be photographically uninspiring, and I usually end up just making some “record” photos there and a perfunctory pano or two.)

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Commentary, Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Big Sur Coastline

Leave a comment

Big Sur Coastline
Big Sur Coastline. Big Sur, California. July 21, 2008. © Copyright G Dan MItchell – all rights reserved.

Black and white photograph of Big Sur coastline with tree covered ridges descending to the shoreline and fading into the distance.

This is yet another in the series of photographs I made on a long drive up the Big Sur coastline during the summer of 2008. The landscape photographer goes into overload on this drive – there is just too much to shoot. This photograph is a stitch of a couple 12MP full frame DSLR images.

keywords: afternoon, atmosphere, bay, beach, big sur, california, cliff, coast, cypress, fog, Forest, haze, kelp, landscape, mist, nature, ocean, pacific ocean, Road, rock, sand, seascape, seashore, sky, summer, travel, tree, usa, water, waves

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Coast Highway – Big Sur

Leave a comment

Coast Highway - Big Sur
Coast Highway – Big Sur. Big Sur Coast, California. July 21, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.

Coast Highway (Highway 1) along the Big Sur Coastline of Central California. Photographed during a “photography drive” up this spectacular and rugged route from Southern California in late July.

keywords: afternoon, bay, beach, big sur, california, fog, Forest, landscape, nature, ocean, pacific ocean, Road, rock, sand, seascape, seashore, sky, summer, travel, usa, water, waves, black and white, stock, coast, highway, shore, shimmer, sun, light, mountains, rock